Over the last few months my lot have carved themselves out a den that spans the entirety of the hedges in the third pic and spend nearly all their time under there now, lazy sods that they are. Come out for food mind you, it's like a chicken ambush when you walk past with some fallen fruit.
Anybody not spot the OEG hen in the first pic?.

It's a good model for the sort of sheltered, shady 'forest edge' conditions one would hope to be able to provide in an enclosed run. not only are they cool and comfortable, but feel secure where they are hidden but can see out. Lucky chickens!

Dont you find you have to go crawling around in there looking for eggs though? When my bantams were all free ranging they had a similar environment, plus barns/outbuildings, and I had an Easter egg hunt every single day!

RichmondHens wrote:Dont you find you have to go crawling around in there looking for eggs though?

Was a sore point for a while. Had a leghorn laying large clutches in there and sitting on them and had started to wonder if a general drop in production was due to more birds laying under the bushes even though we couldn't find any other eggs. Locked them in for a few days and concluded they just aren't laying much, quite a few moulting, a couple of recovering broodies and some that are probably over the hill now.